Families Against Cult Teachings is dedicated to raising awareness and educating to the existence and methodology of dangerous active cults in the United States. Our organization also focuses on working within the law to hold dangerous cults accountable for their actions, and helping cult victims, both past and present, by offering care, guidance, and various kinds of support.

Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Please Note: The purpose of this expose is not to slander, libel or harm Uma Inder in any way; it is to bring awareness, to educate the public and to potentially change her allegedly damaging practices so that no one might be hurt in the future. We of course encourage all opposing views and welcome all new information / evidence at any time. We only wish that Uma Inder would speak with us directly instead of having us communicate with her lawyers.

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As per the documented allegations received, we believe Uma Inder may have abused her position of employment at Yoga Barn (one of the most famous Yoga studios in the world), and at other locations as well to manipulate and exploit vulnerable students.

An ex-student stated the following to give a brief overview of Umaa’s alleged methodology:

“Uma Inder first establishes herself as a spiritual authority through her purported mastery of Yoga, Ayurveda, and Tantra.” As per the allegations, “Through the Yoga Barn in Bali, Uma gave consultations, which give her insight into the psychological weaknesses of her ‘patients.’ Patients then become students at Uma’s yoga classes, and are simultaneously encouraged to and ‘warned’ about joining Uma’s ‘inner circle’ by long-term members. Members of this circle communicate on closed online forums—often eight or more hours a day—their inner thoughts, feelings, and ‘impurities’ to be ‘cleared’ or ‘emptied.’ Once in the group, as Uma said, ‘there is no separate world of thinking or feeling’ - everything was the property of the group, and hence, of Uma.”

Other alleged victims add to this summary the following allegations:

1) “As cult members become more deeply committed, she systematically increases the implicit and explicit requirements to ‘being with her’ to her direct benefit, including free labor, monthly dakshina, implicitly compulsory attendance of her classes at Yoga Barn, and hundreds of hours on her internet forum—all leading toward the possibility of “lockdown” in “inner sanctum.”

2) “Uma Inder systematically broke apart couples, calling relationships outside the cult “based on FalseID,” or other forms of untruth. The less-committed member of the couple would typically be driven out of the cult.”

3) “Uma Inder demands that students ‘quote the Source,’ referring to herself, yet rarely discusses the authorities she pulls from unless it justifies her position of authority. In our view she is wholesale plagiarizing the teachings of others for spiritual fraud and manipulation.”

4) “As followers became more embedded in the group, Umaa Inder’s supposedly finite “process” of 12 years became 24 years, then 48 years, and finally an eternity of “absolute love and devotion” to Umaa Inder. This systematic changing of her sales pitch is hidden from new recruits.”

5) “Uma Inder demands that her followers take “self responsibility” for all consequences in order to avoid personal responsibility or liability for her actions, even as she has admitted to manipulating followers’ minds.”

6) “Cult members are required to divulge every thought, including dreams. Failure to do so is punished. Thus exposed, cult members are more easily controlled.”

7) “Uma Inder demands that her followers sign a waiver and an NDA that fundamentally and extensively misrepresent her activities, for example, by claiming an association with the ‘kundalini awakening process,’ when she is actually practicing classic mind control.”

8) “Language is heavily loaded with insider phrases and terminology, and Uma Inder is a master of the thought-terminating cliché - key parts of mind control.”

9) “Umaa Inder limits the information cult members are exposed to, controlling their consumption of media and requiring that members spend virtually all their free time on her internet forum.”

10) “Private conversations are not allowed. To do so is called “sidelining”, and discovery of private conversations is also met with punishment. Even eye contact with members or non-members outside of the presence of Umaa is also shamed as ‘sidelining,’ and ‘playing with Umaa’s fire.’”

11) “Uma Inder encourages cult members to verbally and sometimes physically abuse each other in the name of spiritual practice, calling it ‘transparency,’ ‘dissection,’ or ‘breaking it all down.’ The goal and result is classic cult mind control—breaking down the psyches of her followers with various forms of abuse, generating a sense of self-loathing in followers before creating traumatic attachments to Uma Inder, the group and its teachings.”

12) “Followers were instructed to “serve their [ego] deaths by serving Uma Inder,” and “die into truth,” through service to Umaa. The reward, which Uma Inder kept continually just beyond reach (because she can’t actually offer it), would be acceptance as a disciple, mastery over the kundalini, union with the forces of nature, and implied enlightenment.”

According to these statements, in our opinion, it appears that by slowly bringing vulnerable students into her group in a way that gradually increases the thought reform, commitment, responsibilities and demands placed upon followers, we believe Umaa Inder may be able to eventually transform students into devoted followers. Her methodical indoctrination process seems to incorporate many classic cult thought reform techniques according to the B.I.T.E. model, including ‘group think’, ‘thought stopping’, deception, psychological and identity breakdown, phobia indoctrination and more.

If you have any relevant information to share, either positive or negative, about Uma Inder please contact us at:

F.A.C.T. Organization Info

Families Against Cult Teachings is dedicated to raising awareness and educating to the existence and methodology of dangerous active cults in the United States. Our organization also focuses on working within the law to hold dangerous cults accountable for their actions, and helping cult victims, both past and present, by offering care, guidance, and various kinds of support.